Sever
by 1Past and Present1
Summary: Shadow has a date. Rouge wants it to be perfect.


"You're being overly exuberant, again."

"Really?"

"Yes," Shadow says mildly, patiently standing almost entirely still save for his smirking lips and watchful eyes. If he's honest with himself, he must admit to himself that he is faintly enjoying the attention.

There is a pause in which neither of them speaks, because they're both quite distracted with each other.

"Am I?"

"Yes," he says again, in the same tone, and wonders what could have happened over the decades of friendship and comradery to have turned him into such a domesticated creature.

"Well, I consider that an upgrade from what you'd normally call 'ridiculous'!"

"Mmhm." His piercing gaze is amused, calmly following Rouge as she hovers around him from a variety of angles so as to fuss about with his appearance in detail. "You needn't try so hard."

"I know. I want to, though."

"I know. But I look fine."

"Yeah, but I want you to be even finer than before."

"As the Ultimate Lifeform, am I not the pinnacle of finery – perfection itself?"

"Blah-blah-blah. You're a knockout even with a bedhead. Whatever. Just let me play. Keeping my hands busy…" She betrays herself with a stuttering inward breath. "It helps, m'kay."

"You're nervous. This is new. I understand." He gently brings his fingers to her hip, cradling her. It would be an invasive, inappropriate gesture for most people but coming from him, it's simply a physical manifestation of their connection. "You needn't be, but I understand."

"Yes, honey, I'm nervous and it's weird for the both of us and I'm sorry, but I can't stop."

"I'm not actually complaining."

"Yeah." The bat pauses quite suddenly, her cool aquamarine gaze darting upward to linger fondly on the dark hedgehog's crimson. "But I'm also super excited and I dunno, but, like, I wanna throw up?"

"Easy, there."

"You're… going on your first date. My Shadow has a suitor. Oh, my god."

He gives her a light squeeze, feeling the excited buzz within her tense muscles.

"Oh, hon."

He accepts a quick, stinging peck to his cheek, outwardly unmoved, inwardly reeling with affection.

"You're so beautiful."

"You've helped."

"You're beautiful without any help."

"That doesn't invalidate your contribution."

"I know I'm being silly, but I really want this to be a perfect first date for you, honey. And so… if you don't mind…"

"I don't mind," he whispers, despite the bruising press of her mouth at the corner of his.

She breathes harshly, as if inhaling some part of him, then abruptly withdraws again. With an assertive nod she returns to her fussing, ignoring the tender way he assesses her so closely.

"Thank you."

"You're welcome," she murmurs back.

"You don't have anything to worry about."

"Doesn't matter. I'll only invent terrors."

"Is that a female thing?"

She gives him a gentle shove, then hurries to smooth out any imaginary creases, earning a quiet chuckle.

"Relax."

"I can't, honey. We've established that I'm an inconsolable mess right now."

"You'll be alright."

Her expression seems to crumble a little, forming cracks in her already strained, pretty mask.

He is massaging her hip. A touch that, coming from someone else, would excite or incite her.

"It's so much to get used to."

"You've made me quite the spectacle, so it won't be a matter of appearing underdressed and unkempt."

"I'm gonna have to step aside and let you go."

"I'll be a gentleman, as I've learned the manners you taught and committed these lessons to memory."

"I'll wonder about what you'll drink and what you'll eat and the things you'll talk about."

At this point he doesn't speak, listening to her distracting muttering as she needlessly caresses his suit into shape, tracing the firm outlines of his body beneath roving palms and skirting fingertips.

"I'll worry that you aren't drinking enough, eating enough, saying enough." She always wears the same perfume and she doesn't seem to realise how her scent is a greater embodiment of herself, as if she can fill a room in some invisible way. Her lips are plump and glossy and bent with anxiety despite their smile. "I'll imagine the way you might find your hand trapped beneath another. I'll hope that you'll feel safe and that you'll like it, but just in case, I'll be thirsting for blood."

He knows that she isn't a woman to fret and certainly not this openly. He tries to see himself from her perspective, this vulnerable and inexperienced man that she sees, and it isn't too absurd to reconcile.

"I'll try to convince myself not to call you a dozen times so I can ask, or stakeout the restaurant so I can watch. In the meantime, I'll be waiting for your call, for your face when you stroll through the door." She finds herself suddenly leaning against him, her head bowed to rest beneath his lifted chin, her hands now merely picking at non-existent flaws. "Be safe for me, honey, and have fun despite me. That's all I dare to ask."

He drags his jaw slowly along the silky white fur of her forehead.

"Gonna be so handsome, honey. Gonna make the whole bloody place gawk and you'll look down because you'll wonder why the place seems flooded, but it'll be an ocean of drool. Yeah."

"How disgusting."

"So, so handsome."

"I ought to exchange my shoes for boots."

"It'd clash horribly with the suit," she whispers, close enough for the warmth of her breaths to deposit phantom kisses on his chest, the parts of him still exposed to her nuzzle.

"Indeed." He doesn't admit it, but he is inwardly stung. He clears his throat after a moment of swallowing the lump away, then purrs, "Will this take much longer?"

"No." She isn't offended, because she knows this is his attempt to salvage her pride. "Just long enough for you to be fashionably late." She withdraws slowly, mussing her fur on the way out, unaware.

He waits for her to recover.

"One last thing."

"Oh?"

She is now strategically positioning the tufts of his chest fur, projecting alluringly from the partially unbuttoned neck of his crisp shirt, as she didn't wish for him to be overly formal, instead aiming for him to imbue a sensation of casual sophistication and chic.

"Ah."

"There." She sighs. "I'm finished."


End file.
